The Destiny of Vegita
by Friendly Uncle
Summary: Inspired by a fanart piece of the same name... Vegita gets back up after Android 18 kicks him down.


Author's note: Another assignment for W131, this time an image analysis. I chose to analyze a fanart drawing by my friend Wolf. The drawing shows Vegita standing alone on a rocky field in the rain, lighting flashing in the background. It depicts him out in the wilderness after his defeat by Artificial Human 18, while he's re-evaluating his life and deciding what to do next. I tried to analyze his emotions and the train of thought that led to him returning to the battlefield. I doubt I can guess what Akira Toriyama really intended for this scene to mean, or what Wolf was thinking about when he drew his interpretation of it, but this is my take on why you can't take Vegita down.  
  
BTW, I don't own Dragon Ball Z, so don't sue me. Unless someone were to pay me for this essay, which I doubt will happen, so just don't sue me.  
  
* * *  
  
The Destiny of Vegeta  
  
The rain was cold.  
  
It was interesting that something like that should bother him. He'd thought he was beyond such things. He'd experienced pain the like of which most people could only imagine. Physical pain beyond reckoning, mental anguish of the sort that ripped people's minds in half, and emotional agony that could drive a man to take his own life. Now, he was uncomfortable because of a little rain.  
  
He almost laughed. That would be a rare thing. He almost never laughed, about anything. Even when a situation was truly amusing he could take no pleasure in it. That would mean removing his mask. The mask he had crafted so carefully for so many years, so he couldn't do that.  
  
His teeth gritted as a gust of wind blew past him, stingingly cold against his soaked garments. His jumpsuit was chafing his joints, and his breastplate was cutting into his shoulders. His muscles ached from standing in the same position for hours on end. He gritted his teeth tighter, willing the pain to go away. It didn't work, his legs burned, and his stomach rumbled. He hadn't eaten for a while. There wasn't so much as a cactus here in this god-forsaken wasteland.  
  
Why had he come here? It was hard to remember. Great, that was all he needed, a nervous breakdown. It would be easy to black out now, to just let it all go and collapse like a felled tree. He was tired. So tired…  
  
His eyes snapped open with a start and he shook his head violently, whipping himself in the face with his wet hair. The rage, Vegeta, focus on the rage. He raised one knee and rested his foot on a rock to relieve the stiffness. That was a little better. He clenched his fists and closed his eyes tightly, raising his face to the rain again, willing it to beat him down. You can't do it, he thought, no one can…  
  
The rage welled up again, and his lips pulled back in a snarl. That wasn't entirely true. In fact, that was why he was out here in the first place. He had been beaten. For all his superhuman strength, for all his finely honed skill, for all his Herculean power, he had gained very little. He wasn't the most powerful warrior in existence. He had lost, and badly. So badly, in fact, that he had run off to this barren place. He had run! He was like a beaten animal, running scared with his tail between his legs.  
  
The anger roared inside him like a flame, a fearsome growl rumbling in his chest.  
  
He had been training for years, and this was all it got him? Such an ignominious defeat was impossible for someone with his kind of experience. At the pinnacle of his abilities, he should be invincible!  
  
It hit him. At the pinnacle of his abilities, he should have been invincible. He obviously wasn't. Did that mean that what he had thought was his maximum had only been one more step in his training?  
  
If he had been beaten, then that meant he had further to go.  
  
His mouth twisted into a smile. Not a happy smile, but an arrogant smirk that seemed more of a frown than any expression of joy. A great weight had suddenly been lifted on his chest, and he let out a deep breath that felt like he'd been holding it for a week.  
  
He wasn't done with his training, not by a long shot. It was time he stopped moping around and got down to business. He would have a lot of work to do if he was going to improve enough to win next time.  
  
The smile slipped from his face into a more stoic expression, and he raised his face to the sky, letting the water wash the stink of defeat off of him. In the distance, lightning flashed and a crack of thunder rolled over him, like a sign that he had finally reached the answer he had been seeking.  
  
He wasn't done yet. He would rise above the limitations that had cost him thus far. He would ascend.  
  
Vegeta laughed, the sound echoing harshly throughout the mountain range. It seemed destiny wasn't finished with him yet. 


End file.
